In the past few decades, much effort has been dedicated to improve electrochemical performance of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) through material design. Less attention, however, has been paid to structure engineering of battery components, which is an effective way for improving the electrochemical performance of LIBs. In this work, a lightweight Cu current collector with a through-hole array and columnar crystal on the surface (CC/THCu) was designed and fabricated using a nanosecond ultraviolet laser and electrodeposition processing to enhance specific capacity and cycle stability of LIBs. The synergistic effect of the columnar crystal and through-hole structure for improving electrochemical performances of LIBs assembled with the CC/THCu current collector was investigated. The results show that the complex structure provides spaces for volume expansion and reduces volume variation. When the hole fraction reaches 20%, the weight loss of CC/THCu is 28.41%. The corresponding LIB with the 20% hole fraction CC/THCu shows a high residual capacity rate of 81.2% and enhanced specific capacity (55.9% compared to the LIB with a bare Cu current collector). At a high rate of 1 C, the remaining specific capacity of the LIB with the CC/THCu current collector is better than that with the bare Cu current collector after 200 cycles. The CC/THCu current collector effectively improves the specific capacity and cycle stability of LIBs in contrast to the bare Cu current collector.
The development of fifth-generation (5G) communication and wearable electronics generates higher requirements for the mechanical properties of copper foil. Higher mechanical properties and lower resistance are required for flexible copper-clad laminate and high-frequency and high-speed Cu foil. Deep cryogenic treatment (DCT), as a post-treatment method, has many advantages, such as low cost and ease of operation. However, less attention has been paid to the impact of DCT on rolled Cu foil. In this study, the effects of DCT on the microstructure and mechanical properties of rolled Cu foil were investigated. The results show that as the treatment time increased, the tensile strength and hardness first increased and then decreased, reaching a peak value of 394.06 MPa and 1.47 GPa at 12 h. The mechanical property improvement of rolled Cu foil was due to the grain refinement and the increase of dislocation density. The dislocation density of rolled Cu foil after a DCT time of 12 h was determined to have a peak value of 4.3798 × 1015 m−2. The dislocation density increased by 19% and the grain size decreased by 12% after 12 h DCT.
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